


Ederlezi

by thankyouandyou



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, M/M, Post-Finale
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-02
Updated: 2015-10-02
Packaged: 2018-04-24 11:46:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,119
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4918324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thankyouandyou/pseuds/thankyouandyou
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He, who swallows cancers. Who breathes nightmares. Pestilence, Famine, War and Death, every single fear in the history of Man, condensed in a human body- Lucifer, with a better sense of style. Undone. The monster on its knees, on this beach where the veil is thin, away from human eyes, exposed to those that matter.</p><p>Will Graham is a speck of dust. Will Graham is dead, therefore  irrelevant. And yet, against nature and nurture, despite everything Hannibal is, everything he knows is true, it is wrong. It matters.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ederlezi

 

 

 

> _μα το φως που δυναμώνει_  
>  _αχ, δε μου φέρνει,_ _δε μου φέρνει_  
>  _κείνον π'αγαπώ_

 

 

God, Hannibal knows, is matchless in His irony. Even when He is kind.

 

*

 

Will dies instantly. His head crashes against the rock, neck snapping forward with a crunch, and there is a lily of blood, blooming upwards through the water. Hannibal tastes it in his mouth when he dives to retrieve the sinking body. It takes three tries, the currents fighting to claim Will as their own, to wipe away his losses. Wary perhaps, of what Hannibal will do with this death in his arms.

Hannibal is stronger. For only a moment, after he’s gathered Will to him, he gives in, holds on and lets their combined weight drag them down. The perfect solitude of it is tempting. The two of them joined in peace, suspended in nothingness. Travelling, perhaps, through time.

The moment passes. Hannibal tightens his grip around Will’s chest and carries them to the surface.

He swims.

By the time he reaches the shore the waters have quieted down in respect and fear. The sea is as timid as a pond as he walks out, but the mud under his feet gives with every step, makes it a slow, precarious progress. It would be easier to drag the body out by the arms. Hannibal holds Will tight against him, chest to chest, keeping his head secured at the slope between his neck and shoulder, as he would hold a sleeping infant. Will’s limp arms loll at his sides, fingers dipping into the water with every step. Hannibal’s hand, where it’s cupped around the base of Will’s skull, is filling with blood.

He carries Will far enough out onto the shore so that the tide, try as it might, won’t get to him. When he lets go, Will’s body goes to the ground with a poignant sense of belonging, the way only dead things do. Specks of his blood and soul pour out onto the black pebbles, seep into the soil. Hannibal follows, falling to his knees without conscious thought. He feels his back curve, his fingers digging into the ground, to stop it from taking what’s his.

The earth does not listen. There are rules.

Hannibal knows his way around them.

 

*

 

He gets his fingers wet in his own blood. In the light of the moon, it seems like he’s dipped them in tar. He pushes Will’s hair away from his face, tenderly, with a hand that, he notes in disdain, is shaking. It grows steadier as he works, tracing the signs on Will’s forehead. He paints his lips red, the delicate skin of his eyelids, the dip of his throat. He lifts Will’s arms carefully, undoes his cuffs and rolls them up, paints the patterns along the path of his silent veins. Will’s skin is colder than it was, a world away, in the snow, back in Wolf Trap. It warms up minutely when Hannibal presses his mouth to the centre of Will’s palm before he lets it go.

He moves back to trace the circle.

He digs it haphazardly into the ground with his nails and the blade of his palm, forsaking ceremony. He knows better than to waste time on the attentions men spare on rituals. His design is haphazard, circle imperfect, but it is deep, and it is complete. Sealed tight around Will, enough to serve its purpose.

The sea behind them has woken up, and it’s roaring, in turns threatening and pleading, for Hannibal’s attention, for Hannibal to not. In all his existence, Hannibal has listened to one plea.

He stares down at Will, vision blurry and faded. Follows the markings on his tired face, the ancient tongue wrapped tight around his wrists. His soul dripping golden into the black soil, feeding the trap around him.

Hannibal crawls over Will. He closes his body around the presence and absence of him, here and not. God’s mercy and His irony. A cosmic farce. Hannibal resents being taunted. He resents being without. There is a great exhaustion pulling at him, a grief too profound for understanding. An anger, too. He, who swallows cancers. Who breathes nightmares. Pestilence, Famine, War and Death, every single fear in the history of man, condensed in a human body- Lucifer, with a better sense of style. Undone. The monster on its knees, on this beach where the veil is thin, away from human eyes, exposed to those that matter.

Will Graham is a speck of dust. Will Graham is dead, therefore irrelevant. And yet, against nature and nurture, despite everything Hannibal is, everything he knows is true, it is wrong. It matters.

The sea begs and reasons. Thunder warns in the distance. The moon, simply, looks on.

 

*

 

He speaks the words in the space between their mouths. They burn like holy water.

He feels his tongue split, hot lashings spreading across his mouth with every syllable, slicing open his lips in punishment. The fire spreads, seeping into his bones, scorching him from the inside out. Blood pools at the corners of his eyes, dripping hot onto Will’s pale skin. The flesh on his hands bubbles and boils, turns black and peels open at the knuckles, revealing the white of bone. He does not stop. He knocks his forehead against Will’s, blind with pain, and he keeps speaking.

The noise is terrible. The earth shakes with it.

The sky above them cracks in half.

 

*

 

It grows quiet, after it’s finished. The world resists fruitlessly for yet another shard of a moment, and then resigns, sighs to a stop.

Hannibal’s breath leaves him, and he crumples onto Will’s body, arms too weak to hold him up. He seeks Will’s mouth, like an animal rubbing its maw into an open hand and seals his mutiny with a kiss, a mindless thing pressed to cold lips. He keeps his eyes closed. He does not care to look at what he’s brought. He knows too well the sight of skies on fire.

The air smells of ozone, sulfur, and burnt flesh. It is done.

“An original take on the original sin.” she says, voice crackling like static. Hannibal can hear her titling her head in curiosity, at the bodies curling together at her feet. At him, the funeral pyre he’s made of himself.

“Shall I believe,” she asks, “that unsubstantial death is amorous?”

Hannibal smiles. It is unspeakably painful. He traces Will’s brow with his ruined fingers and allows himself one sip, one taste of the dwindling light of Will’s soul, enough to make him ravenous, to make him hurt. To fuel what’s coming.

“Hello,” he says, getting slowly to his feet, throat rough from seawater and hellfire.

“Mischa.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the greek cover of Goran Bregovic's Ederlezi, for reasons that will hopefully become clearer in future chapters.


End file.
